Indian anti-corruption party targets ministers

World News : Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Friday named a string of high-ranking Indian politicians he described as corrupt and said his anti-graft Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) would target them in an upcoming general election.

Kejriwal, whose year-old party swept to power in Delhi in local elections in December, is working on a national campaign that is likely to split votes for the governing Congress party and the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

On Friday, he read from a sheet of paper the names of more than two dozen powerful politicians from across the political spectrum and said his party would field strong candidates against them in the polls due by May.

“Suresh Kalmadi. Should we defeat him or not?” Kejriwal asked a meeting of party leaders to cheers.

Kalmadi was arrested in April 2011 on charges of inflating tenders for equipment used at the 2010 Commonwealth Games, which he headed, and served nine months in prison.

All the politicians Kejriwal has accused have denied any charges of corruption. Cases take years, if not decades, to wind through India’s notoriously slow judicial system.

The AAP’s success in Delhi has led to huge interest in Kejriwal and the party up and down India, where voters seem to be thirsty for change after 10 years of scandal-prone rule by a Congress party-led coalition.

The AAP has only recently begun operating outside the capital and its strength is untested.

Kejriwal’s party will contest at least 350 seats of the 543 lower house of parliament seats, senior party member Sanjay Singh said at a news conference on Thursday. Agencies